


Things We’d Rather Forget

by xbedhead



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Gen, Missing Scene, Phone Calls & Telephones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:29:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22839331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xbedhead/pseuds/xbedhead
Summary: Yet another thing to keep Will up at night. One of Mac & Will’s late-night calls following the Arizona shooting and Will’s unintended revelation that he’d included a non-compete clause in his contract re-negotiation.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12





	Things We’d Rather Forget

**Author's Note:**

> This is my second work in the fandom and I’ve enjoyed plucking out bits and pieces during my umpteenth re-watch of the show. Today’s story is brought to you by Mac’s expression after she saw the first footage of the scene outside the Tucson shooting. We see it for a fraction of a second, but she was just a little too shocked for me not to read more into it, especially after her experiences in war zones. I like to think Will would have picked up on that, too, because as clueless as he is sometimes about how to deal with his own emotions, he’s always watching Mac (whether he responds accordingly or let’s her in on him knowing is another matter entirely #emotionallystuntedmenareexhausting). 
> 
> This piece is unbeta’d and set immediately after 1x03 _I’ll Try to Fix You_. Edit to change Will's soft drink of choice to Dr. Pepper. I was going to do that anyway as an homage to a friend who passed away (and loved her some DP), but then it _actually. popped. up._ in the show and I couldn't be more thrilled. 
> 
> Feedback and con-crit are most welcome.

_2:41 am_

_Do you think we should cut down on Gates’ China trip tomorrow night?_

_2:42 am_

_By how much?_

_Why are you still awake?_

_2:44 am_

_1:40 is too much. If we cut 20-30, then look at the South Sudan referendum, we may be able to squeeze in another minute on the Tunisia unrest. I have a feeling on that one; we should look at it more closely within the regional context._

_I’m just awake. Why are you awake?_

_2:45 am_

_I’m not opposed, let’s prep and make it a game-time decision. Tucson is touch and go and we have to budget for that._

_Your message woke me._

_2:47 am_

_I’m sorry. I’ll see you tomorrow. Get some rest._

_2:50 am_

_Will?_

_2:50 am_

_Yeah?_

The phone rings a few seconds later and a slight thrill races through him. It’s pathetic – he’s told himself that every day, every _hour_ really, in the nine months since she’s come back – but on the phone, at night, in the safety of his dark and empty apartment is one of the only ways he can actually _talk_ to her. They joke in the office every now and then, and they’re on solid ground professionally – well…they _were_ , and then she had to find out about that _fucking non-compete clause_ that he’d been all-too-willing bend over for just so he could get her out of there as fast as he could.

And now he never wants her to leave again.

 _Again_. It’s not as if she _left_ before; he _pushed_ her out.

“ _Will_? Are you all right?”

He hadn’t realized he’d answered the phone.

“Yeah, I…yeah, I’m-I’m okay,” he stutters in response, pushing himself up against his headboard and taking in the night expanse littered with a rainbow of blinking lights from skyscrapers and radio towers and planes flying overhead.

“Why are you up thinking about Tunisia? We got home after midnight and need to be in the office in four hours to look at Arizona again.”

Her voice is raspy with sleep and stress. He can hear her bedsheets rustling and feels a moment of panic at the thought that she may be in the bedroom with Wade.

“Keyed up, I guess,” he spits without thinking.

“You need to stop having fizzy drinks so late in the evening.”

“I don’t think it’s the Dr. Pepper that’s keeping me awake, Mac.”

“Then what could it be?” she voices after a beat, her tone laden with the question far heavier than her delivery.

His mouth is suddenly parched, but there’s no glass of water on the bedside table; he left it on the island in the kitchen before eventually wandering in to the bedroom fifteen minutes ago.

“I just, uh…well, today…it – umm…are-are you okay? Because you…today was – it was a lot.”

She doesn’t answer for a long moment and he swallows hard, clutching at the undisturbed bed covers he’s sitting atop. “Are you okay, MacKenzie?” he asks once more, his voice steady now that he’s brushed the edges of what is on his mind.

“That’s…a loaded question, Will. What are you asking in reference to?”

Her voice is cool when she poses the question and he should have expected this. He’d seen the look in her eyes when she realized what he’d done in his desperation to be rid of her. They’d only barely scratched the surface of the implications of that move, then the Arizona shooting had broken and nothing mattered except getting the story and getting it right.

He’d gladly cut another million from his salary if he could take it back; not for himself, but so she’d never have to have known.

“It was your voice.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Your voice…today, during everything in Arizona. You were…it was shaky at times.”

“It’s…a traumatic day, you know. This kind of attack –”

“ _Mac_.”

He can hear her sniff over the line and envisions her face as she gathers her composure to speak.

Her voice is small when she says, “It reminded me of things I’d rather forget.”

Now _he’s_ quiet for a few moments as he considers what she’s told him. When he finally asks her, “What kinds of things?” his tone reverent because he knows she’s probably recalling landscapes of dust and rocks and snow and those she’d been embedded with, the ones who hadn’t come home – or maybe the ones who wished they hadn’t.

“People dying, people with holes in them being taken away on stretchers and helicopters. Standing amid body parts of women and children, old men, in market places after a suicide bombing.”

It hurts. Somewhere in his heart, in his gut, it _really_ hurts. Because he knows about a lot of this stuff in his head, but he won’t let himself acknowledge, _ever_ , what she’s been through. It would make him have to question how he’d reacted, if he was truly justified in the rage and the betrayal and the _hurt_ that she’d caused him with just a handful of words.

_Billy, I need to talk to you about something. I love you more than anything and I think you finally believe that…_

_Fuck. What had he done?_

“Mac…is…are you alone? Do you…do you need someone to be there?”

Because he’ll be there in twenty-five minutes, twenty-three of which will be spent waking up his driver and actually getting to her building eleven blocks away.

It’s cold, but he can probably walk it faster; run if he needs to.

“No, I’m…Wade’s not here, but…I’ll be okay.”

“ _MacKenzie_ –”

“I’m _fine_ , Billy.”

They let the silence hang between them.

“What about you?” she finally chances. “I actually _was_ asleep, but why are you really up and supposedly thinking about Tunisia?”

He sighs loudly into the phone and pushes himself to his feet. His apartment is dim, but he knows the layout by heart, a product of an impersonally decorated unit and countless hours pacing in the darkness. As usual, his feet find their way to his balcony and, despite the winter air, he steps outside in his pajama bottoms, t-shirt and bare feet. The smooth tiles feels like ice blocks against his soles.

“I wish you hadn’t found out about the clause,” he admits shamefully. “I haven’t even thought of it in _months_ and…then, to have it come up today, like _that_. I just wish you hadn’t found out and I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that.”

“It’s fine,” she starts, but then he snaps “It’s _not fine_!” in return and suddenly they’re in it.

“I know it’s not _fine_ , Will, but what the hell else am I supposed to say?” she demands, her voice escalating.

He grips the railing on the balcony, the metal so cold it feels hot against his palm. “MacKenzie –”

“ _No_. Now I know how you really felt and it _hurts_ , Will, but I’m not entitled to being surprised, not after what I did to you.”

“Look, it was…I was _shocked_ , okay. I’d done _everything I could_ to keep you out of my thoughts for the last two-and-a-half years – most of the time, failing miserably – and then Charlie tells me you’re coming to _work_ _with me_ and it was a selfish and mean-spirited thing to do –”

“Not to mention **_stu_** pid. _Three fucking years, Billy_. What on _earth_ were you thinking when –”

“That it would be harder,” he cuts in tiredly, his voice heavy with the admission.

“ _What_?”

He can tell by her tone that she’s thrown by his explanation, but that’s the truth of it. After that drink when Charlie had explained his proposal to remodel their yacht into what would eventually become a journalistic lightship, he’d run as fast as he could to his agent and let them negotiate through some absolutely _absurd_ options for his contract in order to have the power to fire her _as soon_ as professionally possible.

But then he saw her…and then they ran that first program together…and then he _remembered_ what it felt like to have someone who knew his buttons – the ones ready to be pushed and the ones to avoid at times, the ones that were broken entirely and the ones that could be gently stroked if someone whispered that everything was all right.

“Seeing you…every day. I…I thought it would be too hard.” He clears his throat, cursing inwardly for forgetting his water yet again; damn dry winter air. “I mean…it’s not…I still…but it’s _not like it was_ ; not like I _thought_ it was going to be.”

“Am I…supposed to take that as a good thing?” she asks, her tone somewhere between incredulous and hopeful.

“Please do,” he offers sincerely, releasing his vice grip on the railing. He fills his lungs with the frigid air before stepping back inside, feeling lighter. “I’m sorry I woke you up,” he whispers.

“It’s okay. I…I’m glad you did. Will?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for telling me that. It…it doesn’t make it okay, but it…it helps to know a little bit about why.”

He finally reaches his glass of water and downs the fourteen ounces quickly before wiping the spillage from his lip. “It doesn’t justify what I did.”

“No, but…I know what…what **_I_** did, Will, and…I know how it affected you. _I do_. You trusted me – with _so many things_ – and that was a gift that I didn’t appreciate soon enough.”

It’s his turn to take a deep breath and gather his composure now, because that was the crux of it all – he’d let her in, _let her_ _see_ …and it had all crumbled around them.

And then he’d built a life within that rubble. 

But having MacKenzie back, having her here and pulling on him every day, forcing him to climb a bit higher, to reach the top where she was standing, it made him feel good, not afraid of the heights like he’d thought it would. It’s a gift that _he’s_ beginning to appreciate.

But how to tell her?

“Mac…you…you coming back, it’s uh…it’s been the best thing that could have happened to the show.”

He wants it to be more personable, less steeped in professionalism, but that’s all he can give at the moment, feeling far too exposed already. 

“Thank you, Will,” MacKenzie replies, seeming to take the confession for what is it worth. “Are you going to get any sleep?”

He wanders back into the bedroom, water glass refilled and feeling lighter than he had an hour ago. “Yeah, I uh…I’ll be fine.”

“Call me…okay? Will?”

“I will. But…I won’t – I won’t need to.”

“It’s fine, y’know…to need someone, every now and then,” she adds, leaving no mistake that she’s referring to how he keeps everyone at arm’s length. “You know that, right?”

He thinks he does. It’s just hard to remember sometimes.

“I do,” he confesses, knowing it’s close enough to the truth to be what she wants to hear.

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Good night.”

“Good night.”

He tosses his phone on the bed and makes an attempt to crawl inside, this time drawing back the covers and sinking his feet in between the goose down and the four hundred thread count. He’ll replay their conversation for the next two hours, thinking of things he could have said to help her, or phrasings he should have used to get his point across without revealing so much.

And it’s only after talking to her on nights like these that he remembers how empty his home really is. 


End file.
